I have been using Mandriva Linux for a couple of years, so I am not up to speed on WIndows AV software. However, as I remember:

Norton was a system resource hog and didn't seem to want to let go of the PC when I un-installed it - it left bits of itself lying around in memory.

Mcafee seemed to have less performance impact and I had great faith in the product from deploying it on networks that I looked after over a 10 year period.

I used AVG for a couple of years without any problems.

The last thing I tried before moving to Linux was Panda anti-virus, and that wrote thousands of log files to the hard disk, which took twenty minutes to delete when I gave up on it and went back to AVG.

Linux is a good family of secure, high performance, free operating systems. I just wish it was underpinned by a universal method for installing programs, and standardization of driver software for connected devices (with proper OEM support).

A big improvement for me was switching to Mozilla Firefox as my browser, instead of using Internet Explorer. Alot of the viruses and spyware are targeted at Internet Explorer, and they don't get into Firefox . Just using Firefox lowers your chances of infection, and Firefox is a great browser. The multiple tab browsing selection is a great feature, and I like Firefox alot more than IE.

I have some computer geek friends that use Linux. They like it, but they all tell me that it's more for computer-savvy type people, and there are some things that you have to work around, and some things don't work with it. They are all software engineers, so it's no big deal for them.So, that's why I haven't gone there.

I agree with Ace and others about Firefox. Much safer than IE and only use IE when a site refuses to run on Firefox. I also use a plug-in for Firefox called NoScript. http://noscript.net/

It will prevent JavaScript, Java and Flash from running unless you approve it. If you want these to run on a site you have to click the NoScript icon and approve the site or page. As it learns your approved sites, this becomes less frequent.

I think this is a good plug-in to have because scripts, in many cases, are a bigger threat than viruses.

i run McAfee as a anti-virus and Google Chrome as my browser. yes, McAfee is a bit of a system hog, but it works pretty well nonetheless. i get it for free, so i can't really complain. what i REALLY love is Chrome, which asks me every time i download an exe or related file if i want to keep it or not. if it's a file i didn't want downloaded, i just discard it and it's like it never happened...

What do our resident tech freaks and plain ol end useras think a bout McCaffe, Norton and Avast anti virus these days?

Thanks Ice

After about 15 years I just switched from Mcaffee on my and my kids computers (4 total) to BitDefender. Mcafee seemed to forget just whose computers they were! (And that was manifested in many ways, for example, not allowing me to cancel an ongoing scan when I chose to.)